For a while there it looked like City Councilman Paul Cunningham was just going to bag it.
His recent proposal to prod Tucsonans into using fewer plastic bags - possibly with a fee - had prompted strong reaction. Suddenly squeezed between environmental and business concerns, Cunningham clearly did not have the issue in the bag. It seemed like maybe it was time to head to the checkout line on this one: A quiet nod to our right to life, liberty and the pursuit of paper or plastic?
But plastic bags are still stuck on our saguaros, trapped in our trees and meandering into our medians. And so, of course, they are back in our city politics. After some hemming and hawing, Cunningham has released a memo requesting a study session in late February on how to reduce plastic-bag consumption in the Old Pueblo.
The memo outlines some of the scarier points of plastic bags. We use them on average for about 12 minutes, and then we are stuck with them for potentially hundreds of years. It's estimated that the Tucson region runs through 182 million plastic bags a year, a number that really means one thing: There is no excuse for not picking up after your pet (Hello, Reid Park walking path)!
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But it offers no direction. Instead, the memo plays it safe, skipping rhetoric about controversial bag fees and bag bans to focus on something we can all support: a cleaner Tucson! This might foster consensus or just speak to lip service.
About that fee:
For the record, Cunningham is noncommittal about a plastic-bag fee. In fact, he's so noncommittal - saying he's concerned about essentially taxing food - it's almost an expression of being against it.
This might be because the business community reacted so strongly to the idea.
"I asked Paul, 'Do you think the plastic bag knows it's been taxed?' " said Mike Varney, president of the Tucson Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce. "Is the City Council really serving the highest priorities and needs of the city of Tucson by focusing on plastic bags when we have much bigger problems?"
Or it might be that it's unclear if a plastic-bag fee has any real effect or benefit.
The alternatives have their own issues. Paper bags take their toll on the environment. Reusable bags, if left unwashed (like mine), might put you in the ER. That's what a recent University of Arizona study found.
"Our findings suggest a serious threat to public health, especially from coliform bacteria including E. coli, which were detected in half of the bags sampled," Charles Gerba, the UA's renowned germ professor, said when his study of reusable bags was released in 2010.
Or it might be Cunningham just doesn't know what he wants to do about plastic bags.
Given these complexities - the long-term environmental damage, the litter, the imperfect options, the politics of plastic and taxes, the uncertainty - Cunningham has broadened his message. Plastic bags are now just part of a wider beautification program that includes cleaning up medians, a popular idea now championed by the Chamber of Commerce.
"I want to reduce the litter on the streets and get the streets beautified," he told me. The plastic-bag discussion has "absolutely raised an awareness of some of the litter and refuse visibility problems we have in Tucson."
Can't argue with that, but how is he going to do it? And where do we go from here?
Enter Andrew Quigley, an assistant city manager who oversees environmental services and hates plastic bags.
"They drive me crazy," he said, calling them the "national flag of the landfill."
They gum up the curbside recycling facility. They fly out of the Los Reales Landfill and get caught in the fencing. They are a blight on the desert.
Despite these feelings, Quigley was skeptical a ban or a fee would help anyone. Instead he said the focus should probably start with getting more people to recycle their plastic bags at grocery stores. Back in 2009, the mayor and council passed an ordinance that required grocery stores to provide plastic bag recycling. But most people don't use it.
"Everybody goes back to the grocery store," he told me. "They are best to be recycled" there, and not in the blue bins at home, which then jam the recycling plant.
It sounds so easy. Recycle plastic bags at the store, or wash those reusable bags at home. Too bad it's even easier to keep on living in a plastic-bag paradise.
On StarNet: Go to azstarnet.com/news/local/govt-and-politics to find out what your legislators are doing.
Contact columnist Josh Brodesky at 573-4242 or jbrodesky@azstarnet.com
